The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1887-03-12
rARIPP REFORM, No. Q.


over In our preceding articles, we touch
briefly the principle arguments commonly
used In rebuttal of the tree traders posi-
lions
Fist. We maintain that the gorernmen'
has no constitutional right TO tar me PuoHc
for the beneft Of prirote interests Ihis
strikes nj the root of the whole principle
of protection, 1t will not answer TINS
statement D. show that laborers, capitalists
or 10 ms are benefited by protection. II Is
not an answer 10 this TO show that the gov
eminent has right "a rise revenue ny
fay ON imports. The revenue tariff and
the protective tariff are entirely different
things No protectionist need waste time
In attempting to show SO common place
thing AS the fact that government can not
be carried on without money.
In the U. S. Reports, GEO Wallace, p. 665)
any one who is inter ested, can find the de-
cisi If the supreme court that public
tax cannot be levied for private benefit
Our state constitution expressly asserts the
same principle This principle is deliber.
ately violated In the case of all protective
duties which are heavy enough to prohibit
importation; or, In other words. when the
protected article costs the consumer the
whole extra price, and yet no revenue To
the government, as In the case of copper,
which pays duty of cents pound. The
whole import of copper in 1886 was l59
pounds, giving the government revenue
of So 80, while American copper was sell,
Ing In Liverpool two cents pound cheaper
than in New York, passing through New
York on its way across the ocean. Even
rabid protectionist can not claim that tbs
duty Is a "tax which the foreign manufac-
turer pays for the privilege of selling his
goods In America"
Second, the government has no right to
ereate or foster monopolies. Every protected
industry is either monopoly or tends
toward it. Because of protection, coal
rings, copper rings, glass rings, salt rings,
iren and steel rings can fix their prices
arbitrarily and unreasonably, and defy pub
lie sentiment. There are dozens of salt
works In the Ksnawhs Valley, today, lying
Idle, but paying their owners good dead
rent" because other works are making
such enormous profits that they can buy
out competitors. Because of these rings,
the consumer must pay, not the price of
the article, but the price dictated by a
com bination of manufacturers who have
shut out competition. See If you can buy
Ottawa glass any cheaper at home than
you can in Chicago. The price is fixed at
Pittsburg and the consumer gets no advan-
tage by being near the mandatory.
Third, a protective tariff fosters one in
d,lstry at the expense Of another. This is as
plain as common sense can make 1t. The
industries which can live and prosper in a
country, are compelled, by protection, to
carry along on their shoulders the indus
tries that can not live. If farming is the
great industry of any region, the protection
list seeks to tax the farmer to aid his own
business. The farmer is told that he makes
enough to pay his own expenses, and to
help make up the deficiencies of other
people, If manufacturer can get along
without government help, it must help pay
the bills of other manufacturers. BY our
present tariff, our commerce has been
greatly crippled. Foreign ships replace
American ships. Not one of the te or
twelve great lines of transatlantic steam
ears is owned in America. We paid last
year $500, 600, 900 to foreigners for ocean
freight and passenger travel, Let those
who are so anxious to build up American
industry stop and ask whether this three
millions is not worth figuring for.
The ships of today are built of iron, and
iron, by our present tariff, can not be had
by the American ship builders. What we
have lost in money and in business in this
one matter of ocean commerce is enor-
mously in excess of the whole product of
the majority of our protected industries
Fourth, our present tar!t is one Of the
corst of its kind eper devised. Let me quote
here the words OF a republican protection
Journal the Telegraph, OF Philadelphia:
"The tariff laws should be revised for the
reason that they are obscure in meaning,
difficult to nterpret-because they are Of
EN- war taxes, relics of the war; because
hey encourage monopoly by prohibiting
he importation of competing manufac-
lures; because they discriminate in favor
Of some and to the disadvantage of others
because both great parties are pledged to
revise them" L. goes on u speak of the
covering of the price of quinine without
my falling off in the American manufac-
ure. 1t quotes also what Abraham S.
Hewitt stated on the floor of Congress, that
le was a stockholder in an iron mill in |
which, under the present tariff, the dlvi- |
lends were over 100 p p cent. in single
ear"
In the name of encouragement to manu-
actures, our government taxes the raw